Welfare Warfare in the Missouri Statehouse

Gov. Jay Nixon of Missouri made his veto message as blunt as possible last week when he rejected the Republican legislature’s welfare crackdown plan that would end federal benefits for an estimated 9,500 recipients — three out of five of them children — in the first year. “I don’t sign bills that hurt kids — period,” Governor Nixon, a Democrat, declared in vetoing legislation he described as a “mean-spirited” attempt to force adults off public assistance by focusing on their children.

But Republicans enjoy super majorities and wasted no time in overriding his veto Tuesday. One of the main sponsors, House representative Diane Franklin, predicted the new law would put “smiles on the faces of those folks that move out of the poverty trap and move into charting their own destiny.”

The new law changes administration of the federal temporary assistance for the needy program known as TANF by cutting the current five-year maximum for benefits by 15 months. It will also increase pressure on the unemployed to find jobs or lose monthly benefits that average $230 per family. Research shows that nearly three-fourths of the people helped by public aid for the poor are from families headed by someone who works. But that doesn’t stop the easy politics of cracking down on allegedly undeserving poor. In Kansas, a law enacted last month also shortened how long the poor can receive help and even specified tighter limits on where a beneficiary can spend money.

Democrats, decrying an “all-out war on the poor” by Republicans, objected that dairy farmers enjoyed government subsidies they do not really need, while those in deepest need are singled out for political targeting. Pat Dougherty, a former state senator who now lobbies for Catholic Charities, said the new law ignores the extreme desperation of deeply impoverished families: “They’ve got so many problems it’s even daunting to listen to their problems.”

The battle over the safety net is far from over. After the override, Governor Nixon vetoed another Republican bill that would cut the time a laid-off worker could collect unemployment benefits to 13 weeks from the current 20 weeks. Republicans promised another override.